I have a couple of possible entries for both male & female. It's hard to decide which lady deserves the spotlight. Gema is actually very pretty still, despite having a kinked spine from being hurt in the sorority. She has her own home & get along just fine. She got her name because she's my little gem. Because she is still such a pretty girl I'm going to go with Bellona. I don't know a lot of Bellona's story, but I'll share with you what I can.

I was at my local pet store & took a detour from looking at the bettas (they sell only male VTs) with my son to look at the rest of the fish. He gets so tired looking at all the little cups with sad looking bettas sitting in about an inch of cloudy water. While looking this pretty, colorful, and larger than any of mine (2.5 BO) betta was swimming around. Looked at the side of the tank and they had listed 'female betta - $3.99' (same price as their male VTs) I jumped at it. This really was a pretty girl & I needed 1 more for my sorority since the last female turned into a male on me and size and shape it looked like one of Petco's 'king' bettas, so I was getting a great price as well. Brought this betta home, did QT, introduced her to the sorority & named her Pandora. Most passive, sweet lady in my tank. Chased and beat by the other ladies who were about a third of her size. Pandora would just stand her ground and if picked on to much flare and chase the other ladies off and go back to her corner. After about 2 weeks my fiance said one of the females was dropping eggs. I flipped, I'd only spawned once & was still learning so had no clue what was going on. I started watching my ladies closer & noticed two of the others had egg bands very prominent and the last would not leave Pandora's side. I started wondering if Pandora was a Pandora. Took more pictures, posted and asked everyone here. Turned out Pandora was really a Pan, so I had to take him out.

The story at the pet store was that some lady had brought her 5 bettas in and left them for them to sell. I believe with it being 5 'females' it was a failed sorority & Pan would likely be the reason. When I picked Pan they employee had to scare the other 4 bettas from behind the filter for me to see and make sure I was getting the one I wanted. They were colorless, not even white, just no color.

On to Bellona, I sent my fiance back to the pet store to see if there was any chance they had one of these 'females' left. It's been at least a month, so I wasn't hopeful, but I had to try. They still had 2. 1 was hiding and one was swimming around. Brad brought home the one that was swimming in the tank freely. I have to admit that my first reaction was to think that she was an ugly betta, but it was a she and I had my heart set on a 'king' female after Pan turned into a boy on me.

Bellona is just plain unfortunate. There's nothing wrong with her for a pet quality betta, but she's very plain and honestly still kind of ugly. Don't get me wrong, I love her. She's an absolute doll. Just as sweet as Pan was. She's not aggressive at all & gets picked on by all her tank mates when they are in a bad mood.

For the first month or more I had her she hid. I never saw her. In fact during feeding time I had to search her out & make sure she got something to eat. She's finally warming up and swims with the other ladies. She's right up front for feedings & comes to say hi whenever she sees me. Recently I've even seen her flare at her tank mates when they start trying to pick on her. That's all she does though, flare and say leave me alone.

The lovely Bellona -

Oops, when I went through the thread I missed when it was over. I guess Bellona will try if there's a second contest. :)

Good luck to all of you in the contest! These are some lovely bettas and wonderful stories.

the pg numbers next to the names was thanks to the genius of Syriiven! As I went through and wrote down everyone's names, I didn't even think to write page numbers until after everyone was written down! LOL